


never averted

by kornevable



Series: Sportsfest18 [6]
Category: Kuroko no Basuke | Kuroko's Basketball
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-05
Updated: 2018-08-05
Packaged: 2019-06-22 10:32:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,155
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15580011
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kornevable/pseuds/kornevable
Summary: Fills involving Haizaki and Kise.





	1. unsaid

**Author's Note:**

> [Prompt:](https://sportsfest.dreamwidth.org/8539.html?thread=1101147#cmt1101147)  
>  I've dedicated this last year exclusively to the task of killing you.  
> \- Sha Wu Sheng, Thunderbolt Fantasy
> 
> This is a kitsune AU.

Shougo isn't moving, and that in itself makes Ryouta's blood boil more than the fact he managed to capture him so easily. It's so laughable to have this pitiful traitor between his claws, one inch away from slashing his neck and letting him bleed to death, just as he deserves. He will make a cut deep enough so that his agony will be true suffering.  
  
Ryouta is pressing two fingers against Shougo's neck, teeth bared.  
  
“I really want to end you here,” he hisses, his tails menacingly spreading around himself.  
  
“Really, now,” Shougo flatly replies, then his lips slowly turn into a smirk. “Are you even capable of hurting anyone?”  
  
“Do you want to see for yourself?”  
  
He nicks the flesh, producing droplets of blood trickling down his fingers. He feels Shougo swallowing at the sudden pressure, but he's still smirking, as if he's not playing with his own life. Ryouta hasn't seen such a raw expression on his face in a long time.  
  
“You're not being serious,” Shougo taunts. “You can't kill.”  
  
“I've killed countless people.”  
  
“You killed people you didn't fucking know. You can't kill someone you've been living with.”  
  
Ryouta hates it. He hates the fury that's eating him from the inside, he hates the anger that's coloring his words, and he hates the vulnerability painted on his face. There is no reason for him to be so open, so genuine in front of Shougo, when he needs to push aside memories and feelings to use logic. Everyone has always told him he was too reliant on his emotions.   
  
“You can't do it,” Shougo repeats, grabbing Ryouta’s wrist and squeezing.   
  
“I've spent the last year looking for you,” Ryouta whispers. “I've spent the last year thinking about killing you!”  
  
“You can't spout bullshit at me Ryouta, I know you're not fucking serious!”  
  
“Shut up!”  
  
Ryouta raises his claws and makes a dive for Shougo’s neck, but Shougo stops pretending and shoots a fireball with one of his tails. Ryouta hisses and his grip slackens, allowing Shougo to kick him in the stomach and roll away into the safety of the shadows. The pale light of the moon puts on display his mischievousness like a mask, and even if Ryouta knows that his opponent is more often than not ruthless, he hoped he’d face a Shougo willing to listen and talk. It was perhaps too foolish of him; he knows him better than anyone, and expecting him to be obedient or amiable was wishing for a dream.  
  
Shougo rises, his tails ready for battle and his ears on full alert. He isn’t going to cooperate. Ryouta keeps glaring at him, dusting his robes as if it will make a difference in a battle they’ve enacted one too many times. The outcome isn’t certain.  
  
“It’d be much easier if you came with me and faced the village,” Ryouta spits. “Everyone wants answers, and nobody understands why you betrayed us.”  
  
 _Why you betrayed me_  hangs heavily in the air, and neither of them bothers pointing it out.  
  
“The better question is how I did it,” Shougo snorts. “The village was too trusting.”  
  
“You’re an asshole, Shougo-kun.”  
  
Maybe he needs to discard all the memories and feelings, after all.  
  
Ryouta’s tails stand up straight. Powering himself up is all he can do to ensure the success of his mission, betting everything on his speed—and planting his claws in the most deadly spots. Months of nurturing a hatred that he can’t even explain course through his body, pull the threads of his limbs and make him move. He lunges at Shougo, images of similar sparring sessions flashing in his mind and haunting him, but he never falters, never.  
  
Shougo erects a barrier but Ryouta easily tears through it, sending flying shards of magic and he captures his opponent with his tails, once again, snaking around his body, like an embrace.  
  
“You can’t win, because I still know you, even after a year.”  
  
They are close, only a breath away, fiery brown eyes staring at satisfied grey eyes. Ryouta could imagine a world with this person at his side, once, and even if everything tells him to stop reminiscing about what is no more, the reality of facing Shougo and knowing that there are answers right there feeds the embers of neglected hope. He’s so pathetic.  
  
“Please tell me why you left me behind.”  
  
He doesn’t choke on his words, but his voice is so much weaker than what he wanted, and suddenly his rage doesn’t make sense anymore, except that it does and he just wants it to end.  
  
Shougo’s smirk wobbles, only for a split second, but his eyes don’t lie (never, never).  
  
“There’s just a better world outside, y’know?”  
  
“I don’t fucking understand.”  
  
Shougo reaches over, fingers brushing Ryouta’s bangs—and it’s just not fair that a single gesture breaks down all the walls he tried to put around him. One year is long and short.  
  
“Don’t,” he murmurs.  
  
His demand isn’t heeded. His claws ghost over Shougo’s neck, already drawing blood, but Shougo is being an insufferable prick and keeps muttering his incantation, and Ryouta wants to scream.  
  
Shougo covers Ryouta’s eyes with his hands.  
  
“Sleep, Ryouta.”  
  
Ryouta’s arms go slack and his eyelids are heavy, and even though he knows it’s useless to resist, he tries glancing one more time at the man who once shared his life, and who he wants to find again, even in death.  
  
When he wakes up, the only certainty he has is that he didn’t imagine the smile on Shougo’s face.


	2. like usual

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> [Prompt:](https://sportsfest.dreamwidth.org/10320.html?thread=1640272#cmt1640272)  
>  [Most likely to end up in a ditch somewhere at 2:32am]: Haizaki Shougo

This is without a doubt one of the worst days he's ever lived. He can't move and he doesn't remember shit. Well, no, he does remember being clocked in the face, but he doesn't remember how he ended up in a fucking ditch with nobody for miles around. Not that he would know, since he's facing the sky and he can't fucking  _move_.  
  
One thing at time. He was out with Nijimura for drinks, after one hour or two of basketball—the guy is still a beast even though he hasn't actively played for years, and that's kind of unfair since one guy can have only so many talents. They might have run into dudes who wanted to settle some score from forever ago, and he didn't think twice before landing the first punch (or was it Nijimura? shit). First punch leads to a kick and a few blows, and results in a full fight—he probably got dragged to a corner and Nijimura to another, which might explain why he woke up in a ditch alone. He honestly doesn't remember when he passed out.  
  
He groans, tentatively flexing his fingers. When he finds reaction, he gropes for his phone somewhere in his jacket or his pants pockets. He's sort of surprised they left him with a means of communication, unless they were just interested in beating the crap out of him and considered him dead enough to rot fuck knows where.  
  
It's in this kind of situation that he regrets not listening to Ryouta telling him to put people on speed-dial—his eyes aren't focused enough to scroll through the names of his contacts, and even if he could, that would spare him a few seconds of feeling stupid. After two solid minutes of struggle, e finds what he's looking for, and hits the key.  
  
Ryouta picks up as soon as his phone rings. “Where the hell are you?”  
  
“Hello to you too,” Haizaki snorts.  
  
“Don't be a smartass! It's way past 2am, so I'm asking again, where the hell are you?”  
  
Ryouta's voice is uncontrolled, raising a pitch or two at every word he screams, and Haizaki isn't sane enough not to laugh. Of course, it adds fuel to the flames.  
  
“I'm so going to kill you when I find you.”  
  
“I'm lying in a fucking ditch somewhere around the bar I was at with Nijimura. Should be able to narrow it down pretty quickly.”  
  
There is a heavy sigh on the other side of the line, then something akin to sniffling, but by now Haizaki knows that Ryouta doesn't cry for real until he's let go of his anger.  
  
“Try to get up, I want to punch you when I see you,” Ryouta grumbles.  
  
“As if you'll land a hit on me.”  
  
Ryouta meekly snickers. “I'm coming.”  
  
There is a pause, and then Haizaki nods. “I'm waiting.”


	3. wish

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> [Prompt:](https://sportsfest.dreamwidth.org/10320.html?thread=1750608#cmt1750608)  
>  Most Likely To Be In An On and Off Again Relationship

There is a reason why Ryouta never let his family know that he doesn't strictly live alone in Tokyo. Despite the scent of coffee sticking to the walls for the whole morning, the pot is never filled with the same amount every day, a little bit less one day, a little bit more another day. The residents aren't the same either; Ryouta knows exactly how many cups of coffee he drinks before going to work, but then that number changes when Shougo-kun is over because the time allocated for breakfast is as changing as the nature of their relationship. Shougo doesn't have a routine in the morning, like Ryouta has, and that's why the pot isn't filled the same way.  
  
When Shougo isn't here, the apartment looks empty. It is a small apartment, actually, something not too fancy in a regular building and flanked by two neighbors who wouldn't care much about who he is—they probably don't even know whether Shougo is his boyfriend. It's not like Shougo brings many belongings when he comes over; just a few sets of clothes, another pair of sneakers, magazines and groceries maybe (and those don't count as belongings, surely), and a toothbrush that is now permanently sitting in a glass for his use. When he's not here, everything is still neatly put away, waiting to be taken out. Even so, before Shougo started to claim this place as his own, Ryouta had no problems considering it quite cozy and comfortable. And now when he's alone, the rooms smell different, the scent of laziness slowly vanishing in favor of bitterness. Hogging the bathroom doesn't provide him any satisfaction, despite his many complaints about having no room or time to properly get ready for the day. Ryouta only washes the clothes Shougo leaves on the floor before he storms out of the apartment.  
  
During the weeks they don't see each other for a reason or another, be it because they fought or because they decided it wasn't a good idea to keep dating, Ryouta idly checks his phone for new messages, even though he knows that nothing will come up. It's almost wishful thinking—but can it be wishful thinking if he doesn't expect a miracle? The first time they broke it off, Ryouta's anger felt more like a disguised sadness to him; after so many years of getting to know each other, a single petty fight smashed all their efforts into pieces. The second time was surprising, but not unexpected; the third time, the novelty of the occurrence had already worn off and Ryouta simply accepted another period of cooling down before getting back together. It became regular.  
  
And every time, he would look at the screen of his phone, imagining it lighting up with an incoming message. He only imagines it—imagines a life where Shougo would apologize the day right after their disagreement, imagines himself reaching out first and not waiting for a sign, imagines sharing a real home together. His current living-room is barely big enough to welcome a third chair, let alone a couch on which they can lie on, instead of the sofa that's taking more space than necessary. It's not really a dream, nor an ideal goal, it's more of a glorified reality that could be. It could be, if they weren't constantly so damn fleeting. Everyone tells him to stop this nonsense.  
  
And every time he doesn't listen to them.  
  
Ryouta's phone vibrates. An incoming call. His finger ghosts over the receive key, before sliding across the screen. For a few seconds no words are uttered, only their breathing audible. Ryouta thinks about Shougo's disgruntled face when he's trying to come up with nicer phrases.  
  
“...I'm not saying you were right, because what you said was utter bullshit, but I need a place to crash at.”  
  
“I guess we really need to work on our anger management,” Ryouta snorts.  
  
“Nobody works on that. If you're angry then you're fucking angry.”  
  
“Trust me, there are a lot of articles on this. I looked it up.”  
  
There is a pause. “Of course you fucking did.”  
  
“Shut up. Come back and help me eat all those vegetables, they've been sitting in the fridge for two days.”  
  
“Don't even touch your kitchen, you're gonna burn some shit and we'll have to buy a replacement.”  
  
“That's not even your main concern!”  
  
Maybe one day, they will grow into the people they thought they would be together.


End file.
